Stanislov N'Buta (b. 3035[1] - d. July 29th, 3075[2]) was a Khan of Clan Star Adder who led his Clan from 3067 to 3075. N'Buta successfully led the Star Adders through the chaos of the Wars of Reaving, and though his machinations eventually cost him his life, he ensured that his Clan would emerge from the conflict as the undisputed leader of the Home Clans.

Stanislov first came to prominence as an un-bloodedStar Captain in Beta Galaxy during the Burrock Absorption while fighting on Albion. After Clan Blood Spirit forces killed his commanding officer, Stanislov took command of his cluster, and later all of Beta Galaxy's survivors, and by the end of the day had driven the Blood Spirits off the planet, with both sides having suffered equally severe losses.[3]

Following this battle the un-blooded warriors of Clan Star Adder overwhelmingly elected Stanislov as Adder Keeper, and Stanislov became the protégé of Khan Cassius N'Buta.[4] During the Wars of Possession that followed Clan Smoke Jaguar's fall in 3060, Stanislov earned the N'Buta bloodname and rose to command Beta Galaxy. N'Buta took Beta to the Blood Spirit capital of York, where an ongoing war had been raging between Spirit and Adder forces since early 3063. N'Buta announced that the fighting there would end only when the Spirits had paid in blood for every Adder that their interference in the Burrock Absorption had cost, though by 3067 he had turned his attention to other matters. Upon Khan Cassius N'Buta's sixty-fifth anniversary of his decanting from the iron womb, Stanislov challenged him to a Trial of Possession for the Khanship, and won after a four hour battle.[5]

As Khan of Clan Star Adder, Stanislov N'Buta began several initiatives that would have momentous consequences for his Clan. He dealt with the growing murmurs of discontent amongst former Burrock warriors and civilians by transferring the worst cases to the Tanite Worlds, hoping that the heavy labor involved would break them, or at worst keep them from infecting the rest of the Clan.[6] N'Buta also formed Upsilon Provisional Galaxy, a unit with a dual purpose: scouting both the Inner Sphere and potential new colonies, and keeping both Adder-born and ex-Burrock troublemakers away from the rest of the Clan.[7]

The Blakistnuclear strike on Tamar led the Adder Khans to call for the election of a new ilKhan at the Grand Council meeting of February 3071. Expecting to become ilKhan and lead a new drive towards Terra, N'Buta was shocked when his nominated candidate, Garrett Sainze of Clan Fire Mandrill, actually won the post. The Snake Alliance Khans had nominated Sainze and N'Buta between them, expecting that any choice would look rational next to Sainze, but the Diamond Shark Khan Barbara Sennet saw through the ploy and cast the deciding vote in Sainze's favor. A furious N'Buta led his allies in voting against the new ilKhan's proposal to negate the Great Refusal, preventing a new invasion of the Inner Sphere and angering several other Homeworld Clans in the process.[9]

At the Grand Council of December 1st, 3071, the Great Refusal was negated and a new election for ilKhan was opened. Despite being nominated again, N'Buta demurred this time in favor of Steel Viper Khan Brett Andrews. N'Buta remained silent while Andrews unknowingly ignited a firestorm with his first pronouncement - that the bloodnames of all Clans who 'currently resided' in the Inner Sphere were 'tainted' and to be subject to Trials of Reaving.[10]

Knowing that word of the Grand Council's votes and the subsequent chaos on Strana Mechty needed to be delayed reaching the Inner Sphere Clans, Andrews requested that N'Buta handle the problem; this task N'Buta delegated to Upsilon Galaxy, who set about breaking the HPG links between the Clan Homeworlds and the Inner Sphere.[11]

During the Wars of Reaving that engulfed the Homeworlds, N'Buta assisted the Steel Vipers with Adder naval support while turning his Clan's might against Clan Blood Spirit. Seeking revenge for the Spirits' destruction of the Adder enclave on Strana Mechty and the dishonorable death of saKhan Dante Truscott at their hands, N'Buta evacuated the remaining Adder forces from York, then effectively rendered the Blood Spirit capital uninhabitable via orbital bombardment.[12] N'Buta also succeeded in keeping the defection of Upsilon Galaxy and the resurrection of Clan Burrock from becoming widely known, while he personally led the Adder task force that fought Bandit Caste and Burrock forces on Nouveaux Paris, where N'Buta was severely wounded.[13] N'Buta recovered and in 3074 led a combined Star Adder-Cloud Cobra fleet to the Tanite worlds, where the last remnants of Clan Burrock were crushed.[14]

At the Grand Council of February 17th, 3075, N'Buta supported the Goliath Scorpions' unorthodox Absorption of Clan Ice Hellion, and, with the acquiescence of Hell's Horses Galaxy Commander Magnus DelVillar, Absorbed all of the remaining Horses assets in the Homeworlds before using those assets to create a new Clan: the Stone Lions. N'Buta also declared the Adders ready to protect the new Clan from any attempts at Absorption.[15]

When the next Grand Council convened on July 29th, 3075, ilKhan Andrews ordered the entire Clan eugenics program halted for a period of five years, in order to ensure the purity of all bloodheritages. The disquiet this caused amongst other Khans gave N'Buta the opening he needed: using Andrews' own words regarding purity and taint amongst the Clans, and citing the Steel Vipers' own former possession of Spheroid worlds, N'Buta turned on his erstwhile ally and motioned for the Steel Vipers to be subject to a Trial of Reaving. The motion passed with a simple majority, to which Andrews responded by requesting a Trial of Refusal. N'Buta accepted, only for Andrews to pull out a laser pistol - in defiance of the Council's prohibition on carrying weapons - and shoot the Star Adder Khan between the eyes.

N'Buta's dishonorable death, an event he had anticipated, only ensured that his final goal would be accomplished. Andrews himself was bludgeoned to death shortly after by Adder saKhan Hannibal Banacek, while the shocked Grand Council unanimously agreed that the Vipers were not merely tainted but utterly corrupt. The manner of N'Buta's death ensured the final Annihilation of Clan Steel Viper.[16]

Though he did not live to see it, Stanislov N'Buta's leadership left his Clan as the single strongest power in the Clan Homeworlds, a status his successors were well poised to maintain.

After his death, Stanislov N'Buta became venerated as the philosophical father of the Bastion ideology, based upon his writings and actions.[17] N'Buta believed that his Clan could act both as Crusaders and 'neo-Wardens', able to protect the integrity of Clan culture as the Clans transformed themselves into a force capable of driving their way to Terra and reestablishing the true Star League under Nicolas Kerensky's ideals.[18]